Oak is THE burning wood, you’re right.

We have pine around here too but like you I don’t bother. Pine is just oil-soaked light wood that does nothing.

The complement to oak is silver birch. It burns fast, nicely setting up the oak next to it in the stove to burn slow.

Every time both my wife and I are off work, I burn both stoves. Which is frequent. The basement isn’t heated, and its the “TV/rec” room. So that wood stove is crucial. We just had a solid 10 consecutive days in the 20s and teens.

wv wrote:

The weather does get ‘exacerbated’

I was disoriented by that for a sec. Who’s that guy? Who is Harrison?

But it’s Rams special teams coordinator Ben Kotwica talking about Harrison Mevis.

Gee ignore board updates for 10 minutes and suddenly they have an entirely new team.

wv wrote:

“Rams have not played a playoff game with a temperature under 20 degrees since the December 26, 1976 NFC championship game”

What were the temperatures in last year’s Eagles playoff game?

Zooey wrote:

Stafford has played in more cold weather games than Caleb Williams has.

In the past, Stafford did.

But you acclimate fairly quickly. And when you do, your old acclimation goes away. You are basically re-set.

I am originally from Manitoba. I moved from the cold midwest to California, and then to Chicago, and then back to California, and then to Louisiana, and then to Maine.

Your old, years in the past experience with cold has nothing to do with how your body responds to it now. More than once, I moved from cold to warm to cold. When I moved from a warm zone to a cold zone, having been in a cold zone years before had no effect at all–when I was acclimated to a warm zone, having to move to a cold zone meant I had to acclimate all over again to the cold. There was no advantage to having lived in it before.

In Chicago, it’s the wind. The off-the-lake Chicago cold wind means it’s always colder than what the temperature is supposed to be according to the thermometer. You know, wind chill, except wind chill on steroids. There were days in Chicago where walking in a cold winter wind from the subway (or the EL, actually) to the building where I worked meant having to pause in the lobby and wipe the ice out of my beard (moisture from breathing).

Being in that cold wind for a while and having gotten relatively used to it is an advantage. So that’s a Bears advantage.

How much of one? I don;t know, really. But it will be a factor, I just can’t guess how much of a factor.

…

HC Ben Johnson has been making the Bears practice without heaters this season, according to S Kevin Byard. 🥶

Byard also said players weren’t fans of that decision but they can see it making a difference now. 👀

via @AdamHoge pic.twitter.com/aoBLD3PmVb

— Bearsszn (@bearszn) January 14, 2026

Scott Kacsmar@ScottKacsmar
Rams – Scoring defense in 2025

First 11 games – 16.3 PPG (#1)
Last 7 games – 28.3 PPG (#27)

Nate Atkins@NateAtkins_
Some of it is natural regression for the lowest-paid defense in the league.

Some of it is not having Quentin Lake, arguably the defensive MVP, for 6 of those 7 games.

The Rams need to hope more of it is the second one than the first. Sunday will be a great test of that.

Cameron DaSilva@camdasilva
Steelers’ first two HC interview requests:

1. Nate Scheelhaase
2. Chris Shula

Rams are the ultimate coaching pipeline

Zooey wrote:

Which means that there are 2 NFC teams he has yet to meet in the playoffs.

You mean besides the Rams?

They haven’t played the Giants or Commandos in the post-season. And I get why those 2 teams are avoiding the Rams.

As for our time zone, I choose Singapore.

In terms of playoff games, they’ve only lost to 2 NFC teams–Falcons and Eagles. So they have issues with outside the division NFC predatory birds. The solution, of course, is to add those 2 teams to the NFC West.

Isaac@imr__01
Rams penalties per game weeks 1-15: 4.2

Rams penalties per game post Puka speaking on the refs: 6.25

wv wrote:

This was the Oline that got massacred by the 85 Bears defense. Imagine that.

Irv Pankey
Kent Hill
Tony Slaton
Dennis Harrah
Jackie Slater

w
v

They didn’t have a qb. Imagine if they traded up in 83 for Marino. That’s who beat the 85 Bears.

wv wrote:

Spags was too Gospel.

w
v

True. While McVay is too heavy riff-based.

Vermeil was too Neil Diamond.

See? We’re revolutionizing coach assessment.

Every Matthew Stafford Touchdown from the 25-26 NFL Season
.

wv wrote:

“Internal discussions revealed a committee member’s comment that Tomlin was “too hip-hop,” which reportedly played a role in choosing Cameron.”

Cam Cameron went 1-15 and was fired after a year.

Meanwhile, in Pittsburgh, they were immediately impressed by Tomlin.

One good indicator of Tomlin’s caliber as a coach is the number of players who left Pittsburgh and became problems elsewhere, but were never problems with the Steelers, along with the number of players who were problems before Pittsburgh but stopped being that the minute they signed with the Steelers.

Wyatt Miller@wymill07
On Saturday’s game broadcast, Greg Olsen talked about Sean McVay’s evolution as a more aggressive play caller on 4th downs this year.

On Monday, McVay spoke in detail about his approach to 4th down decision-making, specifically in the wild-card win: